


too late

by orphan_account



Category: Digimon Universe: Appli Monsters
Genre: F/M, M/M, hints of yuurei, i guess, it's haruai tho lol, onesided crushes on haru
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-25
Updated: 2017-02-25
Packaged: 2018-09-26 19:01:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9916577
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: rei and yuujin never thought the fight would end.





	

**Author's Note:**

> i actually wrote this a while ago but didn't post till now bc im lazy nya

it's always been a burning rivalry between me and yuujin. always fighting over who would make the better partner for haru. and it's hard to say, but i knew deep down yuujin would've won. there's a bond between them built from childhood and that isn't something i could compete with. not to mention yuujin is a great guy, steady job, toudai graduate, good looks. he's practically got it all, i feel inadequate beside him but it doesn't really matter. at least not anymore.

we both should have expected this, after all these years of pining and glaring each other down, without actually making a move on haru. but it doesn't help that sunken feeling of disappointment.

don't get me wrong, ai looks beautiful in that dress, the white fabric a flowy almost liquid drape over her chest, curving over the dip of her back and trailing off into a sparkling sea of a train that glints with each of her steps, the veil is opaque but i can see her eyes and the apples of her cheeks. she looks ethereal, she simply glows.

yuujin is standing next to me and over the years neither of us had really stopped growing, we're probably the tallest at the ceremony right now, standing at six feet normally, and a couple centimeters higher with these dress shoes.

he seems tense but so am i, i mean we're watching our crush of what? 17 years get married. somewhere inside of me the depression wants to kick in, and it's strenuous to hold it back. with each step closer ai seems to get farther from the alter, it feels like torture. the organ playing the wedding tune behind us seems to increasingly become louder and louder in my ears, it's unbearable and i know my hands have started shaking in the clasp behind my back, yuujin looks at me but i don't have the heart to look back and reassure him that i'm fine. i'm afraid to look into his eyes and see the same feeling that i am in them. i'm afraid to look at him and remind myself that right now, i'm just not okay.

luckily all focus is on ai and her fairytale dress. if people only knew that both of shinkai haru's best men were practically falling apart at the seems, well i don't know what i'd do.

i take a glance at haru and fondly remember him asking us, both of us to be his best men. mentally laughing at him, he couldn't decide on one of us, so he decided to turn this into some sort of male bridesmaid thing. i remember feeling my heart break at that moment. it felt like i'd just been gouged through the chest and i could tell through the smile on yuujin's face, the twitches of the corners, he wanted to die just as much as i did at that moment. even if we weren't exactly friendly, what with the rivalry, we were close friends, i can tell when he's struggling just like he can with me. haru, although close to both of us, was too naive, it probably wasn't even a possibility in his mind for both of his best friends to be so madly in love with him as we were.

when i said ai looked beautiful, i was speaking from the point of a big brother, a family member. but when i look at haru, all done up in his black suit, the top half fitting snuggly to his body, dress shirt curled around his neck with a simple black tie to compliment, words can't begin to tell what i feel. haru is beautiful too, but in the sense that, Wow. i've been in love with this boy, this man, for practically my whole life, if ai was a goddess then haru was the universe. haru was every star in the sky, collected and molded into something of human form. haru was a divinity that no one deserved, not me, not even yuujin. in a sense haru and ai were perfect for each other. they shone like two suns, and my breath catches when the wedding vows begin, haru's hands aren't much bigger than ai's. i can't help but imagine myself in her place, to feel the soft curl of his fingers and to hear the happy stutter in his voice as he recites what yuujin and i know he's been rehearsing for months. he's so happy, a gorgeous smile and tears in his eyes.

i can't look, i just can't. my eyes stay open to watch him lift ai's veil up and over her head, but snap closed when he begins to lean in.

my heart seems to just stop at that moment, a ringing in my ears when the clapping starts. it's so painful, i almost don't notice a rough and callous hand slipping into mine, but i don't need to look to know it's yuujin.

we can't cry yet, we have to show haru that we're behind him every step of the way. not that he thinks otherwise. right now we're his best men, not the pining teenagers we were.

yuujin's hand squeezes mine and i squeeze back, some silent code of ours to comfort each other. i feel like if haru wasn't the center of our worlds we actually could have been better friends.

 

the reception is debatably easier than the ceremony, everyone is getting drunk but neither i nor yuujin can bring ourselves to even nip at the glasses in our hands. the depression i'd tried to stave off for the whole ceremony finally got its gnarly claws around my heart and mind. i feel heavy. yuujin doesn't look much better, it's like i can tell our feelings are roiling in tandem. we feel like brooding but don't, we're at a reception after all.

but at least with everyone guffawing and dancing and yelling, no one really notices us.

"how're you holding up?" he says out of nowhere.

i take a moment, tracing the tip of my finger on the rim of my glass before lifting it to my lips and taking a sip. "just dandy, you?"

yuujin chuckles, a deep, gentle sort, but i can hear the pulling despair at the edges, "same here."

theres a comfortable silence.

"you know. i... i guess i just never thought..." i trail off, but he picks the sentence right up for me.

"...we'd stop playing tug of war with him. that he'd just extend a new end, a failproof handle that she could just," he makes a jerking motion with his finger, "beckon, and take."

couldn't have said it better myself.

the rest of the night feels long and excruciating. we say our congratulations and farewells to haru together. his eyes look so pretty, curved with his smile. that image is burned into my eyelids. this isn't something i'm going to get over.

yuujin and i don't take a cab, settling to enjoy the night. it's not until we reach some playground do we stop. it must look weird to an outsider, seeing two men in dress attire, meekly rocking ourselves back and forth on the swings.

i wasn't sure when i'd started crying, but my shoulders are wracked and my lip is quivering, everything, everything just seems to plummet before me. this was it. the tears burn the edges of my eyes but they won't stop. a gutteral noise leaves the back of my throat, i almost throw up, or at least i feel like it. i don't even have to look up, i can hear him, biting the back of his hand and the screams he'd been holding in all night muffled into his skin. we can't stop crying, our sobs are probably unbearably loud. if anyone were to pass, they'd just think "oh two drunkards, pay them no mind." somewhat i am thankful for that. but i'm sober. i wish i were drunk, i wish i could drown this feeling with alcohol. we're in no state to walk into a bar though.

it's our fault. we never confessed, we never tried to stop this from happening. we're both a couple of cowards on a child's playset, crying like babies. and from this point on, i guess that's all we'll ever be.


End file.
